Sliding phases via magnetic fields - art. no. 054430

We show that three-dimensional "sliding" analogs of the Kosterlitz-Thouless phase, in stacked classical two-dimensional XY models and quantum systems of coupled Luttinger liquids, can be enlarged by the application of a paral lel magnetic field, which has the effect of increasing the scaling dimensio ns of the most relevant operators that can perturb the critical sliding pha ses. Within our renormalization-group analysis, we also find that for the c ase of coupled Luttinger liquids, this effect is interleaved with the onset of the integer quantum Hall effect for weak interactions and fields. We co mment on experimental implications for a conjectured smectic metal phase in the cuprates.